Judi Dutcher drops politics for arts job

05/09/2007

By Mary Abbe,
Star Tribune
May 09, 2007


How do you say E-85 in Russian?

Judi Dutcher doesn't know. Yet.

But the Minnetonka lawyer, whose 2006 run for lieutenant governor came a cropper on a question about the ethanol/gasoline blend, is likely to know soon. She's been checking out Russian classes in preparation for her new job as director and president of the Museum of Russian Art (TMORA) in south Minneapolis. The appointment, which will be announced today, takes Dutcher out of the political arena onto cultural turf.

"This is my new career now, so it's fair to say I have no intention of running for political office at this time," Dutcher, 44, said when asked about her ambitions in an interview Wednesday. She has "learned to never say never," she said, but last fall's campaign, in which she ran with DFL gubernatorial candidate Mike Hatch, was a bruising experience "that took the wind out of my sails."The campaign was difficult on a personal level ... and to have it boil down to whether I was qualified, that was hurtful," Dutcher said. "It takes a while to recharge your batteries, and this opportunity appealed because it is a break from politics and takes me back to what I know."

At the Museum of Russian Art, which is housed in a renovated church at 5500 Stevens Av. S. at the intersection of I-35W and Diamond Lake Road, she will oversee a staff of three and a budget of $1.5 million. That is a far cry from the $150 million she managed as president of the Minnesota Community Foundation from 2003 to 2006, or the budgets she oversaw as state auditor from 1995 to 2003.

Minneapolis businessman Raymond E. Johnson, TMORA founder and board chairman, credited Dutcher's "proven track record" as a nonprofit leader and fundraiser as the key factors in her hiring.

She replaces Brad Shinkle, a longtime Johnson associate who will stay on as the museum's "director of scholarship" and be a mentor to Dutcher, who has no museum experience.

Under Shinkle's guidance, TMORA has begun to develop important ties to private collectors in the United States and to Russian state museums in St. Petersburg and Moscow, from which it has borrowed paintings, lacquer boxes and icons.

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